Spirit of Jefferson. [volume] (Charles Town, Va. [W. Va.]) 1844-1948, 1887-04-26
MISCELLANEOUS.
Monthly Auction Trade Jour
naI-Aprii. 1887.

What o volume the history of New
4 York's successful merchants would
make, Beginning with the life of the
past generation fifty years back
when neither of the two merchant
kings of the world had yet sold one
million, and neither had met his par
allei or analogue; when there was but
i. one merchant on the continent worth
the famous seven figures-JOHN ia
Goa AsToR. His representative of to-
day CT the same name is still the rich
est man on eatth-one hundred and
fifty millions. The brave band of the
q great merchants of the metropolis
have been the hrain and bullion, the
nerve and sinew of every eyentful en-
terprise dating back to the Revolu-
ton, and-beyond. 1t was upon the
cash and jewels and credit of these
immortal mercantile giants that we
beat the British bulldog in 1872, and
but for the pluck and backbone and
coin of her merchant princess, backed
by their bankers, the brave armies of
r the immortal Lee would never have
been beaten. Not the LOYAL LINCOLN,
nor the Heaven born HENRY WARD
BEECHER, whose vast and prodigious
influence was parallel with the army
backed by GRANT with his unnum-
bered hosts, unaided by the unfalter-
ing patriotism and the inieNibIe de-
votion of her peerless and unterrified
merchant kings would ever have
driven into desperation and annihila-
ton the chivalrous sons of the chiv-
alrous South!
Alas! the BURRs, VAN BURENs,
JAYS, CLINToNs and HoFFsIANs that
crowd the bright pages of history!
They were the dead
drones, whilst the working bees that
made the honey were the iIlustrious
merchants of unsullied integrity who
created the vast wealth of the ME-
TRoPoLIs, and built her splendid pal
aces, her grand highways and endur-
ing monuments. From the lofty men
tai forces of these MERCANTu.E NAM
MOTHS came the inspiration, the cour-
age and coin that laid the foundation
of What is destined in the near future
to be the commercial centre of the
world. They were the true masters
who outlined genius from mediocrity
and lived beyond the dead line. The
statesmen and politicians whose brain
was afire with personal pride and ag-
grandizement, claimed the honored
places in history, whilst the SOLID
LOYAL FINANCIAL BACKBONE of the
Republic forget self in their intense
Y faegotien and unswerVing patriotism.
Glancing adown the historic pano-
rama of the eventful past, the eye is
rivetted to this majestic, touching
, and pathetic picture upon which un-
born generations will forever fix their
tinaverted gaze.
To their enduring and fadeless
memory, winds slowly through hill
and valley the Erie Canal, the great
est of the world, and on the tidal
waters of the Hudson from the brain
of FULToN- steam power was born
Her wealthy merchants built the
eighth marvellous wonder of the earth
in any age, ''THE BRoOKLYN BRIDGE. 4"
Her world-renOwned merchants have
furnished the motive power that has
won from mystery her great and gi-
gantic secrets of invention, its wealth
of the earth in coal, iron, oil and
precious metal, and embroidered the
new world with lines of steel and wire
stretching along the path of ten
thousand steam and electric motors :
What history since 1886, with its sir
horse teams, its stage coach and
weekly mail and its barbaric terms of
four. eight and twelve months.
! IL gn1,
en- children" of Abraham, Isaac and
Moses will assuredly control the mer-
camille centres of the earth, the Irish
man will be her politicians, the Ger
man her intoxicators, the cOlored
borther her caterers, the Chinese her
railroad builders, The AMERICAN her
statesmen and presidents.
Ask that unborn generation, of
TOPPING and HoGUET and HOYT and
FENNER, and other Heaven-born auc-
tioneers they will answer, NeUer
heard Of them. Ask for the historic
spot (Grand and Broadway where
once NINTH NATIONAL BROAD
WAY ROUSS imperishabIy imprint
ed across the pages of history, +" Net
spot CASH. and the answer, Gone
long ago-but his trademark is HIS
ToRIC, and will outlive the world of
commerce itself"
In the ''Iong ago." civilization
pooh-pOohed WATT with his steam
kettle, NEWTON with his hobby of
gravitation, GALILEo with his astro-
nomical insanity, JENSER with his in
oculation theories, and fifty years
later DAQUEKRE was laughed to ridi-
cule for claiming that he could fix the
shadow that would live centuries af-
ter the substance had perished in
mould and dust, and coming down to
the generation just gone by, but still
living how well we remember how
superstition scoffed at Morse, with
his wires strung around our national
capital, as he swore by the Eternal
that there were on that floor and in
the galleries then that would live to
see the day when he would send his
silent messages around the earth IN a
moment Of time; and when, twenty
years ago, the dead merchant prince
of cash fought his dead brother ner-
chant prince of time and whole ranks
went down in the terrific crash; when,
still later, RIDLEY and MACY and 9TH
ers cut loose from the tolls of the
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